Author Interview: Sharon Kay Penman

Sharon Kay Penman, the author of Sunne in Splendour,
the Welsh trilogy beginning with Here Be Dragons and two Justin
de Quincy mysteries is one of the most poetic and accurate of historical
novelists.

She majored in History at the University of Texas
and has a Juris Doctor Degree from Rutgers School of Law. She practiced
corporate and tax law for four years. No longer a practicing attorney,
she has this to say about her former vocation. "Yes, I have left the profession
of law, thank Heaven. I looked upon that as penance for my sins: past,
present, and future. I always wanted to write; I just never expected that
I could earn any money at it. So there was no choice to be made. When
the opportunity arose, I pounced upon it."

Sharon was already captivated by the myths adjoining
Richard III during her short career in Law that led to the writing of
Sunne in Splendor, her first published work. "I stumbled onto a
revisionist history of Richard III while in college. This particular book
held him responsible for the deaths of his nephews - the Little Princes
in the Tower - but acquitted him of other crimes he has been saddled with
by Shakespeare and the Tudor historians. Until then, I'd accepted the
traditionalist view of Richard as evil incarnate, and this new image of
him as a decent man, who'd nevertheless committed a reprehensible crime,
aroused my curiosity. If he were Shakespeare's bottled spider, it is not
surprising he murdered his nephews. It would have been surprising if he
hadn't! But if he had been a man of honor prior to taking the crown, what
had pushed him over the edge of that ethical divide?"

"I wanted to find out more about him," Ms. Penman
continued, "and soon discovered - to my amazement and indignation - that
his was the classic case of history being rewritten by the victor."

"I spent a few weeks cornering my friends and
telling them about the injustice done to this long-dead English king.
I got the same reaction from one and all. They'd mumble 'Richard who?'
and their eyes would start to glaze over and then they would edge away.
So to save what was left of my social life, I decided I needed another
outlet for all my Ricardian outrage, and this eventually led to Sunne."

Ms. Penman did exhaustive research into Richard
III, gaining assistance from many libraries in both the States and England
and the US branch of the Richard the Third Society and its parent organization
in the UK. She also spent some months in York, living and discovering
Richard's universe.

Some of her readers have described Sunne in
Splendor as one of the most vivid books they've ever read. They were
enthralled with the rich tapestry of events and the interpersonal relationships
interwoven into the plot. One of her many fans had this to say, "I just
feel at home with Penman's characters and their world, sharing in their
joys and tragedies."